Latest Ideas

Busy Bags:
Lego Tower Patterns
Butterfly Symmetry (lot of work, but very cool)
12 Great Busy Bags
More ideas
Sunbleached Paper for Alphabet search--love it!

Classical Conversations Links

Here are some websites for week by week ideas:

And Here We Go
She Obeyed and Went
Half-a-Hundred Acre Woods
Abecedarian Adventure
CCing it one day at a time...
The Adventures of Bear

Other great links:
Story + Art = StART

October Meals

Freezer Meals

• Crockpot Mongolian Beef
• 
  
• Chicken Tortilla Soup (add rice)
• Baked Ranch Parm Chicken (my version)\
• Boyfriend Dish
• Apple Butter Pork Loin Roast (made this instead, in crockpot...easier, served with Company Potatoes)
• Apple Butter Pork Chops (didn't make these)
• Classic Goulash
• Dressed Up Sloppy Joes
• Southwestern Beef Tacos

Other Meals:

• Yogurt Marinated Greek Chicken
• Leek-y Chicken and Couscous double recipe. Yummy, made with rice, regular raisins, and sub'd broth instead of wine, but use a 50% broth/50% water combo in sauce. got a tad too salty.
•  Au Jus Shredded Beef (crockpot roast with pkg of Au Jus Gravy)
• Spiced Slow Cooker Applesauce
• Apple Strudel Muffins
• Apple Cinnamon Muffins (made this instead)

Meal/Freezer Meals 7/30

Chicken Tortilla Soup (added rice when boiling, used lemons instead of lime)  **loved
 Tomato Artichoke Pasta x2
Stuffed Buffalo Chicken Breasts x2 (*skinny)

BBQ Pork Chops
Homemade Pizza on grill
Tex-Mex Burgers x2

New, easy favorite:
Breaded, Ranch Chicken--pour a little Italian dressing in bottom of 9x13 pan, dip chicken in dresssing on both sides and place in pan.  Coat top with mayo, sprinkle mixture of breadcrumbs, real Parm, and Ranch dry dressing on top.  Bake 375 for maybe 25m??  Super moist!

Literature Units

Blog: Ready. Set. Read.

Titles: Elephants can paint too and Elmer

Title: House for Hermit Crab

Title: Raccoon on his Own

Title: Snowballs
-make snowperson

Title: thank you for me

-flower picture w/ face, put on wall as tall as you are

Title: Bugs, Bugs, Bugs
 

1. Thumb painting
2. Butterfly Stained glass window
3. Spider Web snack

Title: Goodnight, Goodnight Construction Site

1. Build-a-word Sensory Tub
2.  paint with construction vehicles

July Freezer Meals

This month, I tried OAMM and am loving the 5 meal menus!  So much easier to manage.  I actually only picked 4 out of the 5 since I knew our family wouldn't like the fifth.  I doubled each recipe and hope that we like them!  July Freezer Mini-Menu
BBQ shredded pork (will probably give away since Dan doesn't care for shredded meat--kindly told me after I made it)
Mexican Stuffed Shells--good, probably a 3, kids ate it up
Bacon Spaghetti--not again
Tex Mex Hamburgers (made with homemade hamburger buns) So good! Smelled amazing on grill!  Dan liked the buns too.  So cheap and easy to make these.  A success!

**also more complements on Dijon Mustard Chicken (Ann's recipe) for company! So moist!

ideas

love this idea for photos:

 
A great idea for all our special dates

To make/print

Letter Tiles (try this) sheets letter/sound recognition
DIY magnetic letters
Phonics cards
Bible reading plan
DIY magnetic puff balls
Mama Jenn Calendar Notebooks
Mama Jean Calendar Poster'
DIY garden posts kids make
Colors Sort for Carissa
Cut and Paste Letters for Carissa
Playdough mats for Caleb
Homemade Stain Remover

Fountas and Pinnell word level list
Fluency Passage Assessment

Menu 5/15+

Th: Monterey Chicken with Potatoes   x2 Dan LOVES--gives 5 stars
F: Happy Joes Pizza
Sa: Dijon Chicken with salad, oranges, corn/cob (recipe in NHOPC cookbook)
Sun: community group picnic

M: Greek Ground Beef Gyros add more seasoning and feta
T: Little Caesars Pizza
W: Chicken Cacciatore (triple recipe for freezing)
Th: (crockpot) Fauxtisserie Chicken  with Stuffed Bleu Cheese Potatoes
F: OAMC Minestrone Soup x2 (use beef stock), quick yeast rolls

Taco Seasoning Packet

Apple Cinnamon Coffee Cake Muffins okay -don't make again

misc.

Spring Warming Pot scent--3 ingr.:
One More Moore

Striped Burlap Curtains

Random ideas for schooling

Some ideas for activities for kiddos:
Math--
Number strip 0-100
domino parking lot

Reading--
Syllable Clapping Cards
Letter Object Boxes
Dog's Colorful Day book extension activity
ABC ideas from Hubbard's Cupboard
ABC ideas in PDF (clothespin match)

• take letter cards that are cut in half--match up, have the right halves in one bin and left halves in another.
• letter search in magazines. have 3-4 columns with the letter written on top, they glue in letters they find in the rows below.

Explode the Code demo online
LEGOS ideas to incorporate into learning

-handwriting: homemade foam letter pieces for Handwriting W/O Tears
Science--
Nurturing the Tender Years

**organization idea: writing out a workplan for each week for each kid on a paper and attach to clipboard.  They can do whichever activities they want before the week is done, but have to do reading, math, and language each day.  Thought this might be easier to manage rather than doing workboxes.

--easy, soft homemade bread

Activities for 3/12 week

St. Patrick's Day stuff:
Borax crystal shamrocks
Shamrock Suncatcher

Letter A (no time for flashcards), alligator
Letter a, apple
-make egg carton ants. paint 3 section egg carton black, dry, add goggly eggs and pipe cleaners

Preschool Independent Activities

I love some of these activities from Confessions of a Homeschooler.
Preschool Activities

things I would like to do:
Number cards w/ dots--clip on clothespins or paperclips
jar with holes on top, add straws to holes
3D shape sorter
color bear sorter

Prekinders pattern block mats
CoH: magnetic color blocks
magnifying animal matching game

want to buy:
Magnetic Blocks
Ask Me Whooo cd
Imaginets
Wooden Pattern Blocks

Menu 2/13 Week

Monday (Gluten Free): Lemon Chicken (TOH), rice
Others:
Lasagna Roll Ups, salad really good, easy to double, company worthy, made 8 rolls/pan--perfect # for family
Salisbury Steak, buttered carrot slices, mashed potatoes yummy!!!  add some brown gravy powder/water to sauce, sauted some diced mushrooms in sauce--comfort food galore!
Slow-Cooker Chicken and Dumplings, peas/carrots just okay
Cajun Pork Chops--fry each side in hot pan to crisp sides, then bake 350--20m from Festival--not again
Bacon Cheeseburgers, fries
Baked Pork Chops
Herbed Half Chicken--crockpot
Jung's pizza sauce

February's Latest Links

Homemade Liquid Handsoap DIY
Homemade Stain Remover Spray (tipnut--hydrogen peroxide recipe)

Sunday Meal Ideas

Meals for Sunday lunches/easy company meals:
OAMC Minestrone Soup
Lemon Chicken-crockpot
Fake Rot. chicken

Meals 1/27/12-2/10

Sunday lunch: sloppy joes, carrot sticks, chips
Sunday dinner: chicken tacos, rice

Lime-Grilled Mahi Mahi x2 w/diced potatoes, orange slices, homemade bread
Cooper's 1st Bday hamburgers, fries, fruit Rainbow Cupcakes (cupcakes easy recipe, good)
Dan's Bday (out to eat), ice cream sundaes
Caribbean Rubbed Pork Chops with Mango Salsa w/jasmine rice, avocado (good, made w/o mango salsa since mango was mushy. Dan liked with lime, lemon slices)
Asian Chicken and Rice, salad
wedding-reception, frozen pizza for kids
OAMC Minestrone Soup x2 (use beef stock), quick yeast rolls wonderful, loved the rolls
Super Bowl Party
(crockpot) Fauxtisserie Chicken, sweet potatoes, salad really good/easy!
leftover chicken caesar salad
Boyfriend Dish
Anniversary--dinner out
Monterey Chicken with Potatoes (used sweet potatoes and breaded chicken in Italian breadcrumbs) *GOOD

Taco Seasoning Packet

Valentines:
Simple Heart Bookmarks on paperclips
Strawberry Heart Oreos -just made the cookie, super easy, good.
Bread in Can project

1/16/12 Menu

Dinners:
Bacon-Wrapped BBQ Chicken, sweet potatoes, broccoli (not again...3/5*)
Chicken Stuffing Bake **yummy. Had to serve over rice, too spicy! Dan said, "Make again."
Baked Pasta with Ham w/ salad *okay-needed more salt/use stronger cheese, about 3/4# noodles
Steak, Easy Veggie Stirfry (stirfry okay)
Spaghetti and Meatballs *made sauce with diced tomatoes, EVOO, lemon zest, salt w/ tortellini
Italian Turkey Soup w/ bread *LOVE! healthy and yummy. Great to give as meal w/ homemade bread
Smokey Bean Ham Bacon Soup w/ bread *YUCK, not our type of soup
Cranberry Chicken Rice with butternut squash --never made, no in-season cranberries

Breakfast:
Amish Breakfast Casserole okay